Ashland Water Utility, WI
Exceeded the action level in the past
Latest 90th-percentile lead: 6.5 ppb (monitoring period 2025-2025). The federal action level is 15 ppb today and drops to 10 ppb in Nov 2027; EPA's health goal is 0. The latest result is under the action level, but this system has gone over 15 ppb before. Lead comes from pipes, not the source water, so a home with a lead service line can still be exposed. Test your own tap.
About Ashland Water Utility
Ashland Water Utility serves about 8,000 people through 3,067 service connections, which makes it a medium-sized system under EPA's size classes. It is owned by a local government (city, town, county or district) and draws surface water, in Ashland County, Wisconsin. EPA system ID: WI8020373. Ask the utility on your bill for your address in their service line inventory.
Every lead result on file
That is down 2.5 ppb from 9 ppb in the period ending 2024. The highest 90th-percentile result EPA holds for Ashland Water Utility is 18 ppb across 12 monitoring periods, 2 of them over the 15 ppb action level.
| Period ending | 90th-percentile lead |
|---|---|
| 2025 | 6.5 ppb |
| 2024 | 9 ppb |
| 2024 | 5.3 ppb |
| 2023 | 18 ppb over 15 |
| 2021 | 7.6 ppb |
| 2020 | 11 ppb over 10 |
| 2020 | 9.1 ppb |
| 2019 | 11 ppb over 10 |
| 2019 | 8.5 ppb |
| 2018 | 16 ppb over 15 |
| 2018 | 5.4 ppb |
| 2017 | 14 ppb over 10 |
Against other Wisconsin systems
Of the 947 Wisconsin systems with a lead result, the median latest reading is 1.33 ppb; 6 are over 15 ppb right now and 71 have gone over at some point. Ashland Water Utility's 6.5 ppb sits at the 93rd percentile in Wisconsin and the 94th nationally (higher means more lead).
Other water systems in Ashland County
4 other systems share Ashland County; 0 of them have a higher latest lead result than Ashland Water Utility. If you are unsure which one supplies your house, the name on your water bill decides it.
| System | People | Latest lead |
|---|---|---|
| Glidden Sanitary District | 750 | 0.79 ppb |
| Mellen Water Utility | 731 | 4 ppb |
| Butternut Waterworks | 283 | 1 ppb |
| Aspen Ridge | 50 | 0.81 ppb |
What to do in your house
Test your own tap with a certified lab first-draw sample; Ashland, WI may offer free or low-cost kits through the utility. If your own line is lead, replacing the private side runs about $1,200-$12,300 (EPA average about $4,700). Ask Ashland Water Utility whether it covers that cost before hiring anyone - many utilities now do.
These figures describe homes the utility sampled, not your tap. Only your service line record or a test of your own water answers the question for your house. What a 90th-percentile result does and does not tell you: how to read a lead result. Why an old exceedance still matters: over the limit before, under it now.